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Talk page banning
I've encountered a number of editors who seemingly reflexively tell other editors that they disagree with to "Stay off my talk page." The editors who do this, tend to have long lists of folks that have been "banned." Except in specific and clear cases of WP:WIKIHOUNDING, I think this behavior is highly problematic and an indication that the editor is having problems interacting with others. Should this behavior be included in this article? Toddst1 (talk) 18:54, 18 December 2016 (UTC)
- I think it should, as it discourages civil discourse and forces elevation in some cases. Endercase (talk) 16:26, 5 March 2017 (UTC)
Done "suppressing information", "censorship"
What should an editor do if a group of editors is actually actively engaged in these? Assuming good faith only goes so far if they will not engage in civil discourse. The outright banning of sources without a large policy discussion is clearly censorship yet it goes on here virtualy unopposed. Endercase (talk) 16:35, 5 March 2017 (UTC)
- Depending on the situation, WP:RSN or WP:ANI would be the venues to pursue. Toddst1 (talk) 06:30, 27 December 2017 (UTC)
"The editor on a mission to combat POV"
JFG, I understand why you added this (the section). And it is an okay addition. But there are numerous cases on Misplaced Pages where it's just one side pushing a POV and the other side wanting to protect the article from such POV-pushers; it doesn't make the other side part of the problem. For example, men's rights editors commonly target topics in which the weight of the literature is not with them. The side challenging their editing is not what I could call POV-pushing; it's rather that they are adhering to the WP:Neutral policy. In the case of the Pedophilia article and related topics, it's pedophilia and child sexual abuse POV-pushers (meaning those trying to portray the disorder and/or child sexual abuse in some type of positive light or not as harmful as has been noted) who are the problem. Not those protecting the article/topics from such editors. Further, one can want to protect the article from certain POV-pushers and from anyone else who POV-pushes. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 21:36, 11 May 2018 (UTC)
- Well, I totally agree with your caveats, and I don't think this section should be construed as excusing fringe-POV pushers; those will rightly be rebuffed by a plurality of level-headed editors. Rather, it addresses the case of people who feel invested in a "mission" to rid the encyclopedia of POVs that they simply happen to disagree with. Those may be strong and genuine disagreements, but they are still a matter of personal opinion. Such POV-warriors are bolstered by sources, but when confronted with a body of opposite-POV sources, they tend to accuse their fellow editors of cherry-picking or crass partisanship, while remaining blind to their own cherry-picking or crass partisanship. Bias goes both ways, and we should always remain conscious of where we are coming from, in order to leave our personal opinions out of the editing process.
- The text I added was initially authored by Mandruss as a "micro-essay" which I found insightful enough to incorporate into WP:TEND. It is only meant as an example allowing editors to check they are not falling into a POV trap (wittingly or "not wittingly", to quote the eternal words of James Clapper). As this guideline exposes several such traps, it looked like the best place to insert it. Naturally, the wording could be tweaked, although it looks pretty solid as it stands, which is verbatim the Mandruss version. I don't think it should be watered-down here; there are other appropriate places to express the concerns you raised, notably WP:WEIGHT and WP:FRINGE, which make a good job of explaining such nuances. — JFG 06:52, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
- Everybody is biased—except those who don't care about anything, and they generally aren't editing controversial topic areas. I'm struck by the number of experienced editors who don't recognize/acknowledge their own bias, let alone have any awareness/understanding of how it affects their interpretation of policy, let alone do anything to try to moderate/counter that effect. I'm fairly certain they have the majority, and I see that as a serious problem. I think "How often do you edit against your own bias?" is a useful objective self-test, and easy to perform. If you can think of a better way to address this, I'm all ears.
For example, Flyer, pedophilia is not instrinsically "wrong" for our purposes, it's "wrong" only because the preponderance of reliable sources (especially science and academia) say it's unhealthy and harmful. It should not be a moral issue for us as editors, and our emotions need to be checked at the door, as difficult as that is for many of us (I'm a robot and have no emotions). Policy should be the end, not the means to the end. ―Mandruss ☎ 08:12, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
- JFG, thanks for explaining your viewpoint. I often tell editors to not engage in advocacy, by pointing to WP:Advocacy. I do my best to follow the literature with WP:Due weight and to leave my biases off Misplaced Pages, unless my biases happen to align with the literature. But even then, I make it about following the sources, and I do try to see if the minority view should be mentioned in any way. I keep also WP:BIASEDSOURCES in mind. I just wanted to comment on the addition you added and wondered if it might be interpreted as meaning that guarding an article to especially protect it from certain POV-pushers is a bad thing; I'm stating that that's not necessarily the case. The page in question is a supplement page (originally an essay), not a guideline, by the way. If it were a guideline, I would have very likely reverted pending further discussion.
- Mandruss, as you likely know, I work on pedophilia and child sexual abuse topics. A person who has pedophilia (the mental condition) can't change that condition. They can, however, decide not to engage in child sexual abuse. And child sexual abuse (I'm not speaking of complicated age of consent matters) is intrinsically wrong, including for Misplaced Pages's purposes. It's why our WP:Child protection policy exists. If an editor even discloses that they are a pedophile or expresses pro-child sexual abuse views, they will be blocked and/or banned. That's the way Misplaced Pages has been for years, and I've seen to it to have pro-pedophilia and pro-child sexual abuse editors taken off this site. So has Legitimus and Herostratus. Similarly, Beyond My Ken and Jytdog have repeatedly protected articles specifically from certain types of editors. BullRangifer has also done a fair job of dealing with POV-pushers. The bad thing is allowing disruptive editors any leeway unless they can actually show themselves to be productive here. Some of the aforementioned POV-pushers have called me a POV-pusher for stopping and getting rid of such editors. Regardless of their views on that, Misplaced Pages is with me, not with them. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 04:43, 14 May 2018 (UTC)
- Drawn here by the ping. A very interesting discussion. I have written about this topic, tendentious editing, censorship, and about how NPOV requires us to deal with biased sources. It's all in my essay: NPOV means neutral editors, not neutral content. You'll find some interesting thoughts there. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:33, 14 May 2018 (UTC)
- I'm fully aware that most Misplaced Pages principles are two-sided coins and double-edged swords; that's what makes the place a maddening house of mirrors. If the material in question can be clarified without watering it down, feel free to make a suggestion. If that's impossible, I was happy to leave it in my user space where it has lived quietly for the past two years.
I disagree with your approach to pedophile POV-pushers, but I don't tilt at windmills; as you say, Misplaced Pages is with you. It's an outlier case anyway as few issues are as clear-cut. ―Mandruss ☎ 05:36, 14 May 2018 (UTC)- Mandruss, when it comes to pedophile POV-pushers, my issue is not with them simply identifying as pedophiles (although identifying as such is taken to mean that the person is here to push a POV, given how stigmatizing that identification is and that such editors usually want to edit pedophilia topics). There are pedophiles who say they don't condone child sexual abuse, such as those at Virtuous Pedophiles. So-called virtuous pedophiles have edited the Virtuous Pedophiles article. But the vast majority of pedophiles (and hebephiles) I have dealt with on Misplaced Pages have been problematic and needed blocking. And so they were indefinitely blocked. And egregious ones were banned. We have the WP:Child protection policy because of those editors. But do I think it's good for Misplaced Pages to house editors who publicly identify as pedophiles on Misplaced Pages or elsewhere? No. In the same way I don't think it's good for Misplaced Pages to house publicly-identified racists. With the exception of the Virtuous Pedophiles article, I have yet to see a pedophile on Misplaced Pages edit a pedophilia or child sexual abuse topic in a WP:Neutral way, unless, of course, they have and I just don't know that they are a pedophile. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 07:28, 14 May 2018 (UTC)
- Mandruss, as you likely know, I work on pedophilia and child sexual abuse topics. A person who has pedophilia (the mental condition) can't change that condition. They can, however, decide not to engage in child sexual abuse. And child sexual abuse (I'm not speaking of complicated age of consent matters) is intrinsically wrong, including for Misplaced Pages's purposes. It's why our WP:Child protection policy exists. If an editor even discloses that they are a pedophile or expresses pro-child sexual abuse views, they will be blocked and/or banned. That's the way Misplaced Pages has been for years, and I've seen to it to have pro-pedophilia and pro-child sexual abuse editors taken off this site. So has Legitimus and Herostratus. Similarly, Beyond My Ken and Jytdog have repeatedly protected articles specifically from certain types of editors. BullRangifer has also done a fair job of dealing with POV-pushers. The bad thing is allowing disruptive editors any leeway unless they can actually show themselves to be productive here. Some of the aforementioned POV-pushers have called me a POV-pusher for stopping and getting rid of such editors. Regardless of their views on that, Misplaced Pages is with me, not with them. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 04:43, 14 May 2018 (UTC)
- Getting back to Flyer's first comments about this, I also think it's an "okay addition". If I have a quibble about it, it's that it uses the "conservative/liberal" oppositional bias axis, which is not the only NPOV-type of bias that aligns itself in a binary opposition. Further, some types of bias are one of three or a constellation of choices. In addition, this axis of bias smacks of American politics, whereas much of the world would interpret "liberal" quite differently. Like I said, it's a "quibble", but if a more globalized, possibly non-binary arena of bias could be found as an illustration, I'd probably be in favor of it. Mathglot (talk) 08:48, 14 May 2018 (UTC)
- I mean, right. I'm generally sympathetic to the point being made. That's all I really have to say, but I'll bloviate a bit anyway. So a couple things: re "it should not be a moral issue for us as editors", don't know about that. Saying something should not be a moral judgement is a moral judgement, so... you can never escape from the moral universe, not even by sitting behind a keyboard. "My job required me to suspend my moral judgement" has not played well in courts. The ACM Code of Ethics says "it is incumbent on all ACM members to contribute to society and human well-being, and avoid harm to others", while the NSPE's First Canon is "Hold paramount the... welfare of the public"; neither add "...unless your boss says different" and that would apply to volunteer work also. So since I don't want to resign my ACM membership I'm kind of constricted in what I can do here. I can't do anything that would cause harm, even if reliable sources tell me to.
- Anyway the encyclopedia (like all proper encyclopedias) is an Age of Enlightenment entity, and so it's chock full of biases, specifically liberal bias, in the larger, classical sense. I mean the statement "information should be disseminated" is a statement that many people and most governments and churches would not agree with, historically. So it's not like that is somehow a neutral statement. So while we don't have an opinion on the liberal/conservative divide over what should be the tax rate, we do have an opinion on the liberal/conservative divide on whether what the Pope says is automatically true. We are skeptical but that is not the same as being amoral.Herostratus (talk) 02:12, 15 May 2018 (UTC)
I added this addition to the section. I added it per JFG stating above that "I don't think this section should be construed as excusing fringe-POV pushers," and per what else was stated in this discussion. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 23:05, 5 February 2019 (UTC)
So regarding my aforementioned addition, I got a thank you via WP:Echo from NewsAndEventsGuy for my post noting that I had added the addition. And I got a revert from Guy Macon, which I reverted. Guy Macon stated, "While I personally think that this change was an improvement, changes to major policies need to be discussed on the talk page first." I replied, "This page is not a policy page. It's not a guideline page either. And I added this per the discussion on the talk page. The WP:Consensus on the talk page about what is meant by this section, which was added without discussion, is clear. Why don't you make an argument there, or ping all the people I already discussed this section with? Really, the section could be validly removed." Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 03:54, 6 February 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks for the laugh, in a forehead slap sort of way. Guy, as you may already know, "supplement" pages of this sort are a variant of essay. See WP:SUPPLEMENT. Flyer, I think the section is useful, not because it prevents POV eds from engaging in this behavior, but because it could easily resolve frustration by neutral eds who encounter it, amnd may be having an emotional response before understanding just why they're pissed. NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 11:22, 6 February 2019 (UTC)
BALASPS -> BALASP_BALASP-2018-05-26T05:29:00.000Z">
The associated page has a shortcut box for WP:BALASPS, but that shortcut directs to WP:BALASP on the WP:NPOV page. That's wrong. ―Mandruss ☎ 05:29, 26 May 2018 (UTC)_BALASP"> _BALASP">
- This looks like an old error: the editor who first added this shortcut commented:
add shortcut to WP:NPOV#Balancing aspects which is directly relevant
. Accordingly, I have replaced the shortcut with a "See also" pointing to the real WP:BALASP(S) section of our NPOV policy. — JFG 06:14, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
A wrong that needs to be righted
The "Righting Great Wrongs" section of this page should be deleted, or drastically rewritten, and its various shortcuts should be deleted too.
Why? Misplaced Pages:No personal attacks and Misplaced Pages:Assume good faith. We're supposed to assume the best of other editors, and we're also supposed to Comment on content, not on the contributor.
It is usually a violation of the spirit of those two policies when the shortcut WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS is thrown at someone on a talk page, and it's a shortcut that's thrown around a lot. It encourages editors to shift their focus away from content ("this edit isn't well supported by the sources"), and to focus instead on contributors' motivations "you made that edit because you're trying to right great wrongs! I'm onto you, you crusader!" And no, I'm not just suggesting this because it's been used against me once or twice. :) I'm usually uncomfortable when I see it used against anyone. WanderingWanda (they/them) (t/c) 04:56, 4 May 2019 (UTC)
- Those of us who monitor a lot of topics know that WP:RGW is one of Misplaced Pages's great shortcuts which describes many problematic contributions perfectly. Occasionally someone who wants to use Misplaced Pages to tell the world about their point of view complains about WP:RGW but it is one of Misplaced Pages's essentials. Assume good faith does not mean that people should switch their brains off. Johnuniq (talk) 05:20, 4 May 2019 (UTC)
- What Johnuniq stated. It is quite clear when an editor is editing Misplaced Pages in the way that WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS describes, and Misplaced Pages (in general) does not want that. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 23:03, 5 May 2019 (UTC)